Broadcasting Telecasting (Jan-Mar 1956)

and television side by side, under some ideal conditions (e.g., in a laboratory or a carefully insulated living room) and the results are likely to show that television is better — "all other things being equal." The trouble is, of course, that in real life all other things are not equal and probably never will be. If life were always identical to the laboratory equalities, outmoded devices would never survive. If people had the time to sit down and be amused all day. and could make an absolutely "free choice" between radio and television, their choice would be clear. But they don't often have the time, and usually don't want to be amused all day, and really aren't free to make a "free" choice. Similarly, if there were a television set in every room, store, factory, automobile, and so on, of course television would drive radio from the field. But there aren't equal numbers of tv receivers equally accessible everywhere. Similarly, if people could work while they watch tv, the choice would be clear. But they cannot. The inequalities of //^controlled practice are precisely what are not anticipated in the controlled equalities of most laboratory experiments. Some of these inequalities in the uncontrolled field conditions are purely temporary, historical accidents. For example, the number and accessibility of television receivers will presumably be as great as radio's someday. But some of the inequalities of conditions are likely to follow as automatic consequences of the differences in the devices themselves. For example, precisely because television adds visual stimuli to radio, the latter will continue to turn up in those situations for which visual stimuli are bad, for example in automobiles. A grand-nephew of Billy the Kid, Stanley Bonney Colwell, is said to have coined the term "equalizer" for any external condition, in his case the presence of a gun, which made up for one's own intrinsic weaknesses, e.g., his own small size. Among the "equalizers" that keep radio alive these days are: housework, auto driving and anything else that keeps people out of their living rooms; weather, sports, news, music and anything else hard to find on television, and a variety of psychological conditions centering around what is "proper" to certain times and occasions, among which is not included television. Suppose the physical bulk of a television set were suddenly outmoded, say merely a wall picture serving the same primary purposes of entertainment. People would suddenly find that they were short of table space or of decorative balance, or otherwise that something in the living room was missing. A device introduced a few short years ago as an entertainment source has already taken on additional "furniture" duties. The same goes for television's baby-sitting function. It would be missed, even though the main entertainment function for adults remained. As in most things, children are ideal models of what humans in general do when they are given some device to use. A small boy can take a simple stick and so weave it into many uses in his daily activities and so endow it with his own surplus meanings that after a time it is impossible to separate him from it. When the mother then argues, "but it's only a stick," she of course fails to realize that in the uses or functions the boy makes of it, and their meanings to him, it is a gun, a cane, a bridge, a baseball bat, a vaulting pole, and above all his companion. In fact, a bright, modern boy might then turn the same reasoning back on his mother, pointing to an outmoded kitchen appliance which she will not bear to have taken away from her, and saying, "but it's only a radio!" That is, a radio was once "only a radio," but after people have spent a generation weaving it into their lives, it is many things — an alarm clock to wake people up pleasantly, a kind of morning newspaper to bury one's thoughts in at breakfast, a travelling companion in the car, a day-long visitor to help pass the drearier hours of the day for a housewife, an education for the woman who learns about life from soap operas, a game of suspense for the up-to-the-minute news follower or sports fan, a record player for teenagers, a partisan ritual for the avid follower of Fulton Lewis jr., a Muzak sound system for people whose moods respond to music, a prized personal possession for a child, and so on through many more. The uses to which people put a device even include contradictory ones, as for example, when insomniacs use the same radio program to go to sleep to as drowsy drivers use to help keep awake! The engineer realizes how humans multiply the uses and meanings of simple things when, on a holiday, he goes to visit someone else's home that has been "lived in" for many years. He doesn't dare repaint the furniture, rearrange the kitchen, replace the children's toys or exchange their dog for a "better one." In fact, he doesn't dare so much as move an old man's pipe stand or an old lady's tea caddy from one table to another. But these are trivial matters in comparison to what he does back in his laboratory when, unwittingly, he tries to change broadcasting arrangements that have been "lived in" for a generation. It is a testimony for television that abrupt changes in family history have been accomplished successfully, at least in part. One should not really be astonished, however, that the success is only "in part" as yet. For one of the difficulties in supplanting a historical individual, e.g., radio, is precisely that so much history has grown up around him. Promotion of Two Pictures Planned by Mutual, NBC-TV RADIO-TELEVISION cooperation with the motion picture industry has been set in promotions involving RKO Radio Pictures' "The Conqueror" and Universal-International's "The Benny Goodman Story," both upcoming releases. Mutual will broadcast premieres of "The Conqueror" from Paris on Jan. 23, Berlin Jan. 30, Rome Jan. 31 and London Feb. 3. Each program will be presented on the network from 10:15-10:30 p.m., EST, with Mutual commentator Ed Pettitt providing descriptions of the premieres. "The Conqueror," as well as "Jet Pilot," recently was purchased by Howard Hughes from RKO Teleradio Pictures, parent company of General Teleradio and RKO Radio Pictures, but the latter organization will distribute the film for Mr. Hughes [B«T, Jan. 9]. In support of "The Benny Goodman Story," Mutual and NBC-TV have developed a joint promotion centering around the Queen For a Day program presented on the two networks. Plans have been made to select a "queen" to participate in the world premiere of the motion picture in Chicago, Feb. 2. Kaltenborn Says Radio Beats Television in News Coverage RADIO is doing a better job of covering the news than television and from the performer's standpoint is "infinitely superior" to tv, according to H. V. Kaltenborn, generally regarded as "dean of commentators." Visited by CBS' Edward R. Murrow on his Person to Person show on CBS-TV Jan. 13, Mr. Kaltenborn — who also disclosed that he had agreed that day to help in radio-tv coverage of this year's political conventions (for NBC) — was asked by Mr. Murrow whether he thought radio "is meeting its responsibility in covering the news these days." He replied: "Well ... I think radio is meeting it better than television. Television has not undertaken any news analysis, and in the matter of news, I think it gives us more entertainment than real news. Television has a great deal to learn in handling of important news events, and I do hope that this summer when we get into the campaign, that television will do a better job than it has done in giving us sound analysis of candidates, their opinions, and the problems which the country confronts . . ." The 77-year-old Mr. Kaltenborn, who started broadcasting in 1922, also had a word of advice on how to become a "dean": "All you've got to do is live long enough." 'Nightmare in Red' to Repeat NBC-TV's "Nightmare in Red" a filmed documentary on the birth and rise of the USSR, telecast on the Armstrong Circle Theatre Dec. 27, will be repeated on the same program Jan. 24, 9:30-10:30 p.m., according to C. J. Backstrand, president of the Armstrong Cork Co., Lancaster, Pa., and Max Banzhaf, advertising director of the company, who said the second showing was decided on "after an unusually favorable response." BBDO is Armstrong's agency. WNPT Tuscaloosa Joins ABC WNPT Tuscaloosa, Ala., an independent station operating on 1280 kc with 1 kw daytime and 500 w night, joined ABC radio as a basic affiliate on Jan. 15, Edward J. DeGray, ABC national director of radio station relations announced last Wednesday. WNPT is owned and operated by the West Alabama Broadcasting Co. NETWORK PEOPLE John C. Sebastian, formerly of NBC-TV film division publicity staff, named publicity director of CBS Film Sales Inc. He also will serve CBS TV Spot Sales, CBS Television Enterprises and CBS-TV owned stations. Bill Guyman, newscaster, to NBC Pacific Div. radio network, L. A., for news show. Arthur Hull Hayes, president, CBS Radio, N. Y., and native of Detroit, will give principal address at Jan. 29 meeting of St. Francis de Sales Club, Detroit organization of newsmen. Page 80 • January 23, 1956 Broadcasting • Telecasting